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Samsung Promises A New Smartphone Strategy After Poor Earnings

For the past few years Samsung’s mobile strategy was to offer as many possible devices at every price and size, but now the company says it’s ready to buckle down. The South Korean giant promised to focus on “efficiency” moving forward during an earnings call confirming another quarter of shrinking profits.

Samsung didn’t offer any specifics, but implied that it will spend more time developing its flagship phones along with low-cost options. The company also hopes to cut costs on components by standardizing the hardware it uses across its entire lineup. Moving forward we may see a new version of the Galaxy-maker that looks a lot more like Apple with its smaller, coherent product lineup.

Overall, the company confirmed earlier predictions that its profits would continue to decline in the third quarter of 2014. Samsung still sells more smartphones than any other firm in the world, but its market share dropped to 24 percent from 33 percent a year earlier. Total smartphone shipments also fell by 8 percent, while the company’s top competitors all saw solid growth over the same three-month period.

We probably won’t see the new Samsung take shape until next year when it begins to unveil the next generation of flagship phones. In the meantime, we’re still expecting the company to unleash a full lineup of mid-range Galaxy A handsets, though that’s exactly the type of device it may finally be ready to leave behind as it refocuses on what really matters.

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Jacob Kleinman has been working as a journalist online and in print since he arrived at Wesleyan University in 2007. After graduating, he took a...Jacob Kleinman has been working as a journalist online and in print since he arrived at Wesleyan University in 2007. After graduating, he took a...